Sara Sharif: what the judges knew

Sixteen months later, Urfan Sharif, 43, and Beinash Batool, 30, were found guilty of Sara’s murder. The litany of injuries on her body indicating torture meted out over several years shocked even veteran reporters at the Old Bailey.

Soon after the trial, reports showed that serious concerns about Sara’s father had been raised by social workers before she was even born. There were concerns about her mother, Olga Sharif (née Domin), too.

Three times between 2013 and 2019, Sara and her older sibling had been the subject of family court proceedings. All were overseen by Judge Alison Raeside, the senior family judge for Surrey. Two applications to take the children into care had been instigated by Surrey County Council’s children’s services because of concerns about neglect, domestic abuse and future risk of harm. In the final court proceedings, Sara’s father asked a judge to let his daughter and her sibling live with him, unsupervised.

Could Sara have been saved?

Sara’s murder and the trial of Sharif and Batool prompted uproar in the press. Their cruelty was hard to fathom and the system that seemed to have let her down was hard to forgive, not least because it is so secretive.

Family courts operate largely behind closed doors. It has taken more than a year for the judges who run them to accept the media's argument that there is an urgent public interest in greater transparency about this case. Private family court papers seen by The Observer now reveal the push and pull of evidence for and against removing the children from Sara’s parents.

Removing a child from its family is never a neutral act, says Lucy Reed KC, a family barrister and chair of the Transparency Project charity.

“Placing children in state care for the duration of their childhood is in itself harmful and should only be done when it is really necessary,” she said.

The family courts operate on the principle that the least intrusive order compatible with children’s safety is the right one. In Sara’s case, that principle was tested to destruction.

The first chance

In January 2013, Urfan Sharif, a taxi driver originally from Pakistan, and Olga Sharif, originally from Poland, were taken to a family court in Surrey, where they were living in temporary accommodation in a single room with Olga’s two children, the younger one of whom was Urfan’s. She was pregnant with their second child together – Sara.

Social workers told Judge Raeside that there was “ongoing and worsening neglect, lack of supervision… plus unexplained injuries to the older sibling/half sibling”.

There were also allegations of domestic abuse, and social workers noted Olga’s “failure to prioritise the children’s needs over her relationship.”

The social workers wanted the children put into temporary foster care, and the unborn Sara removed at birth.

It didn’t happen. Despite making many allegations that Urfan Sharif had hurt her and her older child, Olga kept retracting her accounts of his violence. Despite the misgivings of social workers – but on the recommendation of the children’s court-appointed guardian and a Surrey County Council family support worker – Sara, born on 11 January, and her siblings were allowed to stay with their parents.

A second chance

By the end of 2014 Urfan and Olga were married and living together. Sara was not quite two. The family apparently played a game which ended with the eldest child being bitten. Their school noticed the bite mark, police were called and Olga was arrested and charged with actual bodily harm.

The children were taken into immediate police protection, and the local authority applied to the court for an emergency protection order. This meant the council could keep Sara and her half-sibling and sibling in temporary foster care while it made further enquiries.

From the family court papers it’s clear that social workers were now extremely worried about all three children, especially the eldest; Olga’s child had special needs and required skilled parenting which the Sharifs were struggling to provide, and allegations of domestic abuse were again being made – this time by both Olga and Urfan against each other.

Independent experts were also consulted. Twice during these proceedings, social workers pressed Judge Raeside to remove the children into foster care; twice the experts recommended less extreme intervention. The social workers had little option but to row back.

On the second day of a final hearing, a note made by one of the barristers says that Olga “dramatically announced that she wished to separate from Mr Sharif and disclosed that she had been subjected to domestic abuse by him”.

Olga, with Sara and her sibling, were immediately placed in a refuge in a different town. Sara’s older half-sibling was already in foster care due to special needs which the Sharifs could not meet.

With Urfan out of the picture, the plan of removing the two younger children fell away, but it soon emerged that Olga was still meeting her allegedly violent husband. At times she let him see the children unsupervised.

The council told the court it believed Olga should no longer have care of the children or stay in the refuge. By July 2015, social workers were again urging Judge Raeside to take Sara and her sibling into care – and the plan was now for them to be adopted.

But different council workers took different views. One family support worker had submitted an addendum report saying that Olga “had made real changes in her parenting since separating from Mr Sharif”.

The worker recommended that the children be placed in Olga’s sole care but under supervision. The child protection social workers had little option but to row back again.

In the meantime the abuse allegations against Urfan Sharif were never tested in court and never proved. Officially, no domestic abuse had taken place.

Judge Raeside ordered that Sara and her older sibling should live with their mother, but supervised contact with their father was allowed for three hours every Saturday, moving to unsupervised contact in the future – on one condition.

Urfan was to complete a domestic violence perpetrator programme at the earliest opportunity. This was not a court order, however, and there is nothing in any of the family court documents to suggest anyone checked that Sharif completed the course.

At about this time he met Beinash Batool, a woman who had been cast out of her own family for running away with a man she fell in love with. She was young, and soon she was pregnant with the first of four children.

‘I am going to hope for the best, all right?’

By March 2019 Sara and her sibling had been living with Olga and seeing their father unsupervised for more than three years. But then Sara complained of her mother pushing her head under the bathwater, strangling her, smacking her and putting her in isolation as a punishment – and said she wanted to live with her father.

She and her older sibling did not return home. Urfan applied to the family court for a new child arrangements order formalising the new status quo, and the transcript of the final court hearing in October 2019 shows that it was Olga who was viewed as the risk, not Urfan. The question before the judge that day was how Olga could spend time with her children. The idea was mooted that Batool should supervise.

“It’s only thanks to Ms Batool that you’re able to really see [them],” Judge Raeside told Olga. “Otherwise I think it would be really difficult… and she’s, you know, she’s making an effort. Are you able to make an effort?”

The judge was suggesting that Olga should be more grateful to her ex-husband’s new wife.

The transcript shows that Surrey County Council now wanted the family off its books.

“At the conclusion of these proceedings… the intention will be that Surrey County Council children’s services do not have any further involvement,” a social worker explained in court.

To help the judge, a recently qualified social worker wrote an assessment of the family that Judge Raeside praised as “very thorough”.

It listed a string of allegations of domestic abuse by Urfan Sharif against three women and his children – but did not analyse those risks. As a result, he emerged in a rosier light than might have been expected.

But a safeguarding letter written by a Cafcass (Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service) adviser who did a police check on both parents painted a greyer picture. Urfan’s check revealed a conviction for theft, a caution for another theft, a police “no further action” following a report of battery made by Olga; more allegations that he had threatened to kill her if she didn’t go back to him, and another “no further action” following reports of actual bodily harm.”

Why were the family court’s alarm bells not clanging?

The historic allegations against Urfan Sharif had still not been tested or proved, and there were no recent accounts of domestic abuse. The family court transcript shows that “nobody wanted to challenge the social worker’s report, so it would have been very difficult for the judge not to accept it”, Reed says.

“There is no sense in these proceedings that Urfan Sharif was seen as a current risk – at this point he was seen as the protective parent.”

A new order confirming that Sara and her sibling were to live with their father was effectively rubber stamped by the court.

“I am going to hope for the best, all right?” said the judge.

Three years and ten months later, Sara was dead.

January 2013

Sara Sharif is born during family court proceedings triggered by concerns for her elder half-sibling and sibling.

September 2013

The case concludes without care orders. All three children return to Sara’s parents Olga Domin and Urfan Sharif under a supervision order.

November 2014

Concerns prompt social workers to start care proceedings. Adoption is briefly mooted. Instead, the eldest child, who has special needs, goes into foster care.

May 2015

After withdrawing allegations of domestic abuse, Olga informs the court she is separating from Urfan. She flees to a refuge, taking Sara and Sara’s sibling.

November 2015

The Sharifs agree that Sara and her sibling will live with their mother. Believing the risk to be reduced to acceptable levels, the court approves the plan.

June 2016

Urfan signs an agreement with Surrey County Council promising to begin a domestic abuse perpetrator’s programme “at the earliest opportunity” as a condition for seeing the children unsupervised. No record of him completing it has been found.

2015 – 2019

The children see their father unsupervised. In March 2019, Sara tells him her mother has been abusing her. After this Sara and her sibling stay with Urfan and his new wife, Beinash Batool.

8 October 2019

Urfan requests an order to formalise Sara and her sibling living with him. The order is made by Judge Alison Raeside. Sara is six years old.

2020 – 2023

Four months after the court order is made, messages start being sent by Batool to her sister saying Urfan is abusing Sara.

Spring 2023

A safeguarding referral is made by Sara’s school. After a six-day investigation the referral is closed down by social services.

April 2023

Sara is withdrawn from school to be taught at home.

8 August 2023

Sara is murdered. Her father flees to Pakistan with Batool and their children, and his brother. Two days later Sara’s body is found by police under a blanket at the family home.

11 December 2024

Sharif and Batool are convicted of Sara’s murder.

Photograph: Surrey Police